Capturing video includes the process of transferring media content from a recording device such as a digital video camcorder to a computer. A user is required to capture video in order to edit the media content of the video with a computer non-linear video editing system, or to store the media content on a computer. Recording devices (e.g., digital video camcorders) may have any number of memory systems with a common one being a tape based memory system. Capturing from tape based recording devices is a real-time process such that capturing 1 hour of video to a computer requires approximately 1 hour of time. Other types of recording devices (e.g., flash based memory, optical drive based memory, or magnetic drive based memory) have similar requirements.
Video capture applications typically allow the user to preview the media content while it is being captured. For example, the media content is stored on a recording device in the form of a DV-AVI video clip or MPEG-2 video clip. In order for a user to preview the media content as it is streamed to the computer, video capture applications must decode the video clip from its native format into an uncompressed format as it is received.
Users are required to manually apply processes to generate metadata, correct and enhance the video after completing the capture of the media content to the computer. Additionally, the generated metadata is stored in a location defined by the process generating the metadata. Since metadata generating applications are made by a number of different developers, there exists no common location and format of metadata generated for any given video clip. Thus, it is difficult for an application produced by one developer to use or even access metadata generated by an application produced by another developer.